


Dean Walks into a Bar

by Blake



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Dean Winchester's one-night-stands, Guilt, John's a horrible father, M/M, Pre-Series, Sam's at Stanford, Very non-graphic het because hey it's Dean Winchester, Weecest allusions, season one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-28
Updated: 2013-03-28
Packaged: 2017-12-06 19:19:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/739199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blake/pseuds/Blake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Overanalyzing attraction never worked for Dean.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dean Walks into a Bar

Dean walks into a room, he’s got a headcount of attractive people in two seconds. It’s a talent. Tonight it’s Pike’s Tavern, this dirt-road joint in Minnesota that smells like fish, and there are six people inside that Dean would fuck. He takes a seat at the bar, orders a whiskey. People stopped carding him a couple months ago, as if it was the youth in his face that walked out and moved to California.

Brunette in the booth is taken, military boyfriend, shared beers. Two girls on the far end of the bar, they’re a little too blind-drunk for even Dean to catch up with, will probably be passed out or gone before Dean can figure out which one is more into him. Pixie-cut two stools away is downing shots with a scowl smothering her features, definitely here to drink angry, not to be hit on, but still, Dean puts a bookmark on her; he’s charmed his way past darker clouds than hers. The bombshell sipping soda with her eyes fixed on the TV is pregnant, which is totally not getting in the way of her hotness, but which is definitely a sign of a more complicated situation than Dean can step into for one night.

But the third-wheel sitting by the door? Hasn’t stopped staring at Dean since he walked in. Dean meets his eyes, flashes a smile. The boy blushes and startles, and oh yeah, Dean can definitely work with that.

Boy looks lonely, Dean thinks, finishing his whiskey. The best course of action settles into his mind as firm and easy as the drink settles into his stomach. He goes over to the boy’s table, takes the seat next to him.

“Hey there,” he says, simple, dropping an arm on the back of the boy’s chair. He’s pretty, this one, short black hair, girlish features, bookish college-town look. He struggles to make eye contact with Dean, and then struggles some more.

“Hi?” he says finally, blushing again. He’s timid, but not clueless. He leans back slightly into Dean’s arm, knows why Dean’s here.

Satisfied, Dean smirks across the table at the boy’s friends. They look as surprised as the boy is that their third wheel isn’t such a lame, unwanted, pity case after all. Saving singles from their condescending couple-friends is a method that goes back a good five years, back when Dean was still in school. It worked wonders on the almost-popular girls.

“Hey man, can I talk to you a second?” Dean asks, turning back to the boy, nice light eyes. There’s silence, the boy staring into Dean’s eyes like they’re riveting. “You know, about the thing, with the--”

“Right, oh right, yeah,” the guy finally says. He wraps a hand, surprisingly big, around Dean’s arm. Dean glances at it, sees a flash of broad-tipped, calloused, golden-skinned fingers gripping his shirt-- then the flash settles into real vision, fingers that are actually slim, smooth, pale. The length must have fucked with his brain for a second. Easy mistake. Dean relaxes.

Over his shoulder, he throws a smug, tight smile at the silent, preppy duo. It’s the _Sorry, your friend has a secret life that’s way too cool for you to know about_ smile he used to use when picking Sammy up from school, his friends frowning curiously at the old car with the young guy inside. Sam never appreciated it much.

“My name’s Brian,” the boy says to him, and Dean is back in the bar. He smiles at Brian, who is blushing less, acting more like he knows what’s up. Dean likes people who know what’s up, and considers himself one of those people: he feels attracted to somebody, he doesn’t question why, just goes for it and sees what happens. If there’s one thing he can’t stand, it’s when somebody questions and analyzes their attraction until it’s dead. What a turnoff.

“Brian,” Dean tries out, as if he’s imagining saying it in different tones of voice. The blue in Brian’s eyes flares. He seems like a straight-forward kind of guy. Dean gambles on that. “What do you say I finish rescuing you from the clutches of your friends, and we get out of here so they can stop staring at us?”

Brian goes still, except to look down slightly, somewhere behind the bar. Frantic, Dean thinks of the motel room he’s calling home tonight, his dad huddled and mumbling, surrounded by crumpled pages of research. He doesn’t want to go back there tonight, defeated and alone. He backs up. “Or can I get you another beer?”

“No, just,” Brian says. He bites down on his lower lip, but not the way coy girls do, not the way Dean does when he knows somebody’s looking for it. He’s thinking. Then, sharp with courage, he looks up into Dean’s eyes again, and says, “I just, want to know your name, first.”

_First_. Dean bites back a smile. He flickers his gaze to Brian’s wide shoulders, the thing that drew Dean’s attention to begin with, that frame of bones stretching out his t-shirt instead of muscle. “Name’s Sam,” Dean says, first thing he comes up with. It’s part of his job, going by different names. The fact that it’s his brother’s name isn’t that weird, he tells himself. He looks into Brian’s eyes, smiling at him in a way he hopes comes across as easy-to-read.

Brian breaks into a shy grin and rubs his forehead with the inside of his wrist, messing up his bangs in a thoughtless way that reminds Dean of something and sends his stomach dropping. His breath steadies when he reminds himself that nothing good ever came out of analyzing why you’re attracted to somebody.

 

Today, they’re exterminators. Parker and Sons, but don’t ask about the other son because he ran off to college last year and left his family to rot.

Dean stands behind while his dad gives the spiel: heard complaints in the area, routine inspection, no cost to you. The house is gray, the sky is gray, Dean’s stuck wearing a stupid jumpsuit, and he wonders what the weather is like in California right now.

His dad clears his throat. Obedient, Dean snaps his attention to the situation at hand, looking for whatever his dad wants him to pick up on. It doesn’t take long to find.

The owner of the house, standing in the doorway, keeps looking in Dean’s direction, even though Dean is not the one doing the talking. The guy-- Aaron Kayiatos, if John’s research is correct-- sets his eyes on John, trails off into eyeing Dean’s body a few seconds later, and then turns back to where he’s supposed to be looking with a jolt. It’s a pattern, and a pretty obvious one at that. They’ve only been talking to the guy for two minutes, and it’s already hard to miss.

Dean lets it roll off him. It’s not like it makes him uncomfortable to be looked at. The guy’s not bad looking, either. Dean’s not attracted to him or anything, but he’s got a rawness, a leanness to him that most professional types don’t have. He’s young, and dark-featured enough that Dean would totally be into a girl version of him.

His dad clears his throat again. Harsher this time, and it startles Dean out of his mild ego-boost. He looks at John, who subtly nods his head in Aaron’s direction. Dean gets the hint, starts taking over the conversation.

“They’ve got a real bad case of termites four doors down, see,” he lies, no mention of the murderous spirit that might be attached to the pocket watch Aaron bought at an auction last month. Dean flashes his brightest grin. “Way harder to get rid of once they set up camp, so we just want to take a good look, catch ’em before they start unpacking their tents.”

Aaron laughs. He bends over and laughs. Dean exchanges glances with his dad. Dean shrugs, because it wasn’t even a joke, let alone a good one. John raises his eyebrow, because he apparently wants to change the plan.

“Jake here’ll fill you in on more of the details while I take a first sweep of the house,” John says, even though Aaron’s head is still bent, his fist still against his mouth. “Your basement through that door?” John points to somewhere within the house, and Aaron straightens up, and Dean sees his smile.

His smile looks just like Sam’s. Sharp, split-open across his face, muscles tight around it. Something like a knife twists in Dean’s gut.

John is already through the doorway. Dean must have missed a few seconds. His mouth opens and shuts as he tries to think of something to say that isn’t _But, Dad…_ He’s relieved when his dad looks back over his shoulder, but it doesn’t last. John’s expression is firm, pointed. It’s disdainful, even, saying _Don’t fuck this up._ John has never so much as heard Dean _talk_ about kissing another man, let alone given his opinion on any aspect of Dean’s sex life, but apparently, he doesn’t _have_ an opinion. This look he’s giving Dean, it’s not saying _I’m disgusted with you_ ; it’s saying _Whether or not you’re disgusted, you better not let it get to you until the job is done_. That’s the kind of guidance Dean gets.

His dad disappears further in the house, and Dean tugs the collar of his jumpsuit closer to his neck. He feels naked without his jacket, but you really can’t stuff leather inside a jumpsuit. He’s tried.

“So, your name’s Jake?” Aaron asks him. Dean dares to meet his eyes again, see that smile. It looks so much like Sam’s. Sam laughing so hard Dean could beat him at wrestling, laughter the only weapon Dean had against him the year Sam sprouted into an enormous frame with heavy-long limbs. Sam grinning huge, it splitting like a seam across his newly broad face when he felt too good to believe that it was a bad thing, what they’d done. The lines at the corner of his mouth, filling out the new space under those cheekbones Dean sometimes dared to touch, just to see how hard they were under soft skin.

“Yep. Aaron?”

“Yes. Do you want to come in? I can offer you a beer, or something?” The smile has faded, and Dean feels comfortable enough to accept.

“I usually don’t drink on the job, but sure. While I, you know, fill you in on the details.”

Aaron chuckles at that, but he’s turning the other way, walking through the hall. Dean follows behind, tries to find that smile in the new darkness. “It can be overbearing, can’t it?” Aaron tosses over his shoulder. Dean walks two steps behind. “Working for your father. I would know. I work for my dad’s law firm. Man never stopped giving orders in all my twenty-eight years.”

“You’re a lawyer?” Dean asks, suddenly interested.

“Yessir.” They make it to the kitchen, and Aaron cracks open the fridge before bending to stick his head inside.

“My brother’s going to be a lawyer.” It slips out of his mouth, all wrong. How was that relevant at all?

“Yeah?” Aaron straightens up, hands Dean a bottle and points to the bottle opener lying on the counter. “Where’s he study?”

“He goes to Stanford.” Dean hates how fast, how proud it floats out of his mouth. Sam’s shiny life, fancy education, all that, it’s something Dean hates. Not something he wants to be proud of. He’s not in control of what he’s saying, and he really needs to be. He’s on the job. He pops open the bottle, takes a sip. “Where did you go?”

“Just U of Montana. Not as smart as your brother, I’ll bet.”

He smiles. He looks so much like Sam, even though he’s shorter than Dean and is scrunching his hand in his curly, near-black hair. Dean swallows some more beer, and hopes his dad finishes up soon. The beer curls like disgust, like guilt, in his gut.

 

He’s getting pounded deep, relentless, so hard the sounds he’s making have more to do with his diaphragm than his throat. He’s close, _so_ close, so much over stimulation he feels like he might start vomiting up vital organs if he doesn’t come soon, hollowed out so good he almost feels complete.

Release. He feels himself filling up the condom, still wet with the other guy’s spit, keeps his hand moving until he can’t move anything anymore, can’t even hold himself up. He collapses, feeling fucking _everything_ rushing through his veins. He realizes he’s biting a pillow, then realizes the guy has stopped. Probably came, and Dean didn’t even notice, too wrapped up in getting drilled into the mattress.

There’s a sandy-blond head on the pillow when Dean opens his eyes. Sean, that was his name. By far the hottest person at the hotel bar, and sometimes, Dean’s almost relieved to be overwhelmingly attracted to a dude. After the weirdness with that Aaron guy earlier in the day, the simplicity of things running through Dean’s mind (“hot dude,” “want that,” and “gonna get that”) was comforting. Not everything has to do with Sam.

Sean is snickering. It makes Dean cool off instantly, feeling defensive. “What’s so funny?” he asks, stripping off his condom and starting to clean up. He hopes Sean will let him use his shower.

“Do you always call out your own name when you come?”

Dread punches a hole through Dean’s stomach. It was a mistake, it’s in the past, he doesn’t have to think about it. He focuses on aiming the tied-off condom into the trashcan, bam, three-pointer.

But Sean doesn’t drop it. “Sam, Sam, _oh, Sammy_ ,” he whines. It’s not even cruel-sounding teasing. Dean shouldn’t be bristling.

He paints on a stiff smile. “Wouldn’t you be that into yourself, if you looked like this?” He gestures down the length of his body, and Sean laughs some more.

Dean gets up to slink away to the shower, makes the mistake of looking down. Down there on the bed, Sean is sprawled across so much space, taking up room with his long limbs and stretched-out torso the same way Sam took up room when he shot up like a weed, when Sam got big enough to _make_ Dean do things, when Sam was suddenly strong enough he seemed fucked-up, instead of fucked-up-by-Dean. Sean’s bony shoulders look like things just barely too big, things Dean just barely can’t hold down anymore. Dean remembers biting his way down the tendons of a narrow neck, feels sick for even having thought that tonight would be normal.

 

Dean is a sick son of a bitch, but at least not on paper. Not for the last fourteen months. So what if he thinks about fucking his brother a lot. He’s not actually fucking him, so where’s the crime? And yeah, he picks up boys sometimes, young guys who sometimes look like his brother. But who’s to say that isn’t just his taste? Maybe he likes them because they’re skinny and soft and not that different from a girl. And even if he does like them because they remind him of Sam, well at least he’s not fucking his brother.

And the times he knows what he’s doing-- (like the time he woke up days in a row from dreams he couldn’t shake, walked around half-hard, miserable, distracted, unsatisfied no matter what he tried, until he tried finding Sam’s closest look-alike in all of Iowa and putting the dream to flesh, emptying himself in stripes across the guy’s shins, so spent he could actually forget for a week)-- well that’s just practical. It’s a _good_ thing, putting this somewhere it doesn’t fuck up anybody’s life. Putting it somewhere Dean doesn’t need to feel guilty about.

And he’s not hurting anybody when he jacks off in the shower with a memory playing behind his eyelids, a memory from when he _did_ fuck his brother, from when his brother was fucked up like him and _wanted_ him to. On paper, it’s just his own hand on his own dick, jacking it like every other person on every other day. On paper, it’s not sick. He isn’t making his brother do anything.

He feels about as noble as a drunk gone sober after his friends empty his liquor collection down the sink.

That’s not the reason he’s looking for girls tonight. He’s looking for girls because he likes girls. He likes them a lot, always has.

This one’s named Alyssa.

She’s fucking fantastic in bed.

After she falls asleep, Dean keeps on brushing his fingers lightly over her hip. He should fuck girls all the time. Fucking girls makes him feel great. Pursuing them, charming them until they’re convinced, initiating shit with them, _fucking_ them: none of it makes him feel like a horrible person abusing his power to force people into insane things they would be better off without, none of it makes him hard with his own guilt. When it’s a girl, it’s just awesome. Why does he even bother with dudes?

In the morning, Dean gets the room cleaned of all traces of her so when his dad gets back they can jump right back into work. They’d put the watch-spirit case on hold for a night, since John was needed out of town. From what Dean could gather from one side of the phone call, it was another hunter, friend of John’s, needed emergency help with something. Dean didn’t bother asking to come along.

He opens the windows, airs out the smell of the girl’s perfume and good sex until there’s nothing left in the room but Dean.

 

Finally, Aaron Kayiatos gets in his Mercedes and pulls out of the driveway. It’s the thing they’ve been waiting for these three long hours. Dean follows his dad up to the house, gets the lock picked, and then they’re inside, scouring the place for the watch John couldn’t find the other day.

Just their luck, five minutes later, they hear the quiet purr of the Mercedes pulling back into the driveway.

Dean looks to his dad, who’s frozen for a second, then melts. “Go distract him.”

“What?” Dean whispers, his blood drowning out his hearing.

“He likes you, distract him, get him out of the house. I’ll finish.” John turns back to the drawer he’s tearing apart using a flashlight.

“But he looks like _Sam_.”

First words into Dean’s mind, and god how he wishes they weren’t the ones that came out of his mouth. If the resemblance isn’t weird enough, Dean’s awareness of it and _willingness to have spent an hour flirting with him the other day_ makes it fucking bizarre. He waits for judgment.

“No, he doesn’t,” John declares, turning back to give Dean a look he can barely see in the dim. He says it as if his opinion makes it a universal truth. Dean was wrong, so it isn’t weird.

“Yes, sir,” Dean agrees, spine straightening as he absorbs the last of the look John is giving him. It’s so ingenuous and rigid at the same time, Dean’s having a hard time telling if John really has been so oblivious to the weirdness between his sons, or if he’s been working this whole time to believe something into existence; tell yourself you’re a good father of a good family enough times, even your sons will take it as truth. The dumb ones, anyway.

John shoos him away with a flick of his flashlight. Obedient, Dean runs. He makes it out the side door, sprints up the walkway, and gets to the foot of the front steps just as Aaron is getting out his keys.

“Hey,” Dean says.

Aaron smiles at him. The porch light makes his teeth shine white and puts shadows in the crinkles of skin around his mouth. Dean suddenly thinks, _Of course Dad didn’t see the resemblance. I’m the one who made Sammy smile like that._

“You’re not in uniform,” Aaron says. He sounds cautious and quiet, suggesting implicit things without assuming too much.

Dean smiles back, letting the implicit things shine in his eyes the way he knows how. His breath isn’t quite recovered from sprinting, but he hopes it makes him sound charming. “Yeah, thought I’d stop by on my own clock, t’see if maybe you wanted to take me out for dinner? You know, seeing as you’re the one with the lawyer’s budget.”

Aaron sets down the plastic shopping bag he’s been carrying. He comes down the stairs to the walkway, moving slowly enough to give Dean time to back away, so slowly Dean doesn’t believe the guy is actually going to go for it. He flinches, surprised, when Aaron lifts a broad hand to his cheek. So slow, but still, Aaron is kissing him before he even realized it was going to happen.

He smells good. Tastes good. Dean pushes his lips into the kiss just a touch, and then suddenly, Aaron’s giving it his all, and fuck, he’s a good kisser.

They slow down and taper off, Aaron doing all the leading, Dean all the following. It isn’t until Aaron murmurs, “My lawyer’s budget also put satin sheets on my bed,” that Dean realizes he’s point-five seconds away from getting hard in his jeans. Somewhere between all the damp breath, warm smell, and cushioned lips, Dean started _wanting_ this guy.

Dean could insist on dinner first, do as his dad said and keep the guy out of the house. Or he could keep Aaron upstairs and distracted, and get a good lay out of it.

Thinking with his dick means not having to think about why he _shouldn’t_ follow his dick. One of Dean’s options is sex. The other option is suffering an awkward dinner, distracted by thoughts, (such a pervert, can’t even have sex with a man because you’re afraid of how much you’ll think of your brother, too fucked up for normal, functional adult sex with people you’re attracted to, can’t get it up when you’re being pursued because _you’re_ the one who makes bad decisions, whose fault it is, who breaks things by needing them,) and then jerking off in the shower later, painting the shower tiles with a load that’s too dirty to put in any girl, and _way_ too dirty for his little brother, who left.

There’s a lingering, patient space between his body and Aaron’s. Dean presses forward until it’s gone.

Aaron’s such a damn good kisser that Dean’s head is reeling by the time they make it up the stairs and behind the bedroom door. Isn’t till Aaron’s mouth trails down to his neck that he puts it together, Aaron’s mouth moves just like Sam’s. Sam’s mouth, once he’d grown up a bit, after they both realized their fucking around wasn’t just for convenience’s sake, when Sam moved like he wanted to kiss Dean’s skin because it was _Dean’s_ , not because it was skin. Aaron’s mouth is moving like that. Dean’s so hard he could cry.

Up against the wall, and Aaron is stripping him of his clothes too carefully. Dean grabs a fistful of dark hair, pulls Aaron’s mouth off his chest so Dean can beg to his face, “Call me Sam. S’my real name. Sam.”

Aaron murmurs, constant, breathless, thoughtless. Things that make Dean crazy.

_God, you’re beautiful, skin’s so beautiful, Sam. Wanna taste all of it._

_Fuck, Sam, taste so good, could do this to you all night._

_Such a beautiful boy._

_Your mouth, Sam, your fucking mouth._

_Gonna come for me baby, gonna._

_Your lips look so good like that, Sam, wrapped around my dick like that, suck it, Sam._

_Want me to touch you here, don’t you baby._

_Sam._

_Sam._

_Fuck._

_Sam._

Dean never even makes it to the luxury satin sheets.

He and Aaron are a pile on the floor, making out because everything still smells and tastes like sex, and Dean is too spent to move anything but his lips. He’s remembering a time when he wouldn’t have felt weird about this. He would have kept it tucked in the corner of his mouth like a private joke until he got back to the motel, and he would have bragged to Sam, “Yeah, let this guy suck me off today, kinda for the job but let me tell ya Sammy, I came so hard, cause this guy was so pretty, Sammy, had a mouth just like yours.” And Sam’s face would have crumpled into a battlefield of disgust, jealousy, irritation, all bloodied up under a flattered blush, and he would have smacked Dean’s arm and Dean would have hit him back and they would have laughed and fought and rolled around until Sam found a way to use his own pretty mouth.

But Sam isn’t waiting at the motel, and so Dean feels watched by him all the time. On paper, no, he isn’t fucking his brother, isn’t doing anything bad. But he _still_ feels guilty, even though Sam is the only person who could know what Dean is doing is fucked up. If Sam saw the way Dean’s cock leaks when the person bending him over cries out _Sam_ , would Sam hate him? If Sam saw how pathetically Dean still obsessively needs traces of him, would he be scared, disgusted? _Yes_ , Dean knows, because yes, Sam left.

The Impala’s engine starts up down the block, a perfect sound Dean could pick out from a mile away. It’s safe to leave the house. Aaron doesn’t ask for a phone number. Dean gets dressed, in between wet kisses. He likes Aaron. The great thing about one night stands is you get to be close to someone for one night, and when you never see them again, it’s not because something went wrong.

 

Dean doesn’t do this kind of thing that often, but the kid has a tattoo on his neck and clearly hasn’t washed his stringy short hair in weeks and his pants are falling off his skinny ass even though he’s wearing at least three belts. He doesn’t seem the type to pass judgment on Dean for being weird.

This kid, Tyler, has been following him for a good five blocks now. It’s been an even mix of curious pestering and flirting-by-insulting, a trick Dean hasn’t used since the sixth grade. Dean is supposed to be breaking into one of these warehouses and burning the body of a spirit who got kind of pissed off about getting buried in her own workplace because her bosses didn’t want to report the work-related casualty. Those are his orders. But then he accidentally walked past some noisy club, grew a second shadow named Tyler, and the company sure isn’t helping him find the right warehouse. The kid is annoying, but also kind of hot, and beneath the unwashed smell and beer, there’s an underlying scent of _Sam_.

So Dean is pinning Tyler to a brick wall, chest to chest, lips a sliding mess.

“Let me suck your cock,” Dean says gruffly. He presses a quick hand to the bulge in Tyler’s jeans, thumbs up and down the zipper impatiently.

“God, Pretty Boy.” The insult sounds different after a gasp. “Maybe you’re not so out of place after all,” he laughs, pushing his thumb against Dean’s lips and pressing.

Dean gets to his knees and holds the boy by the hips while he sucks him off. He’s built so small, Dean can hold the entirety of his hip bones in his hands, can hold the whole length of his cock in his mouth. Dean’s nose presses against damp curls that smell like fresh sweat, sex, dirt, Sam.

Tyler tells him what a pretty mouth he has, which he also told Dean earlier, but this time he leaves out the part about pouty lips not being punk rock. Dean pulls away so that a string of saliva drapes across his lower lip, a trick that works better when there’s no condom, but even without the precum, it’s dirty.

It’s filthy when Dean spins Tyler around, slicks his own hard on with spit and lays it between Tyler’s barely-there ass cheeks. He keeps his arms locked tight, one around Tyler’s waist, the other around his shoulders, and rides his crack until he’s close. He breathes in from the skin of Tyler’s neck, mouths a layer of grime ’til it’s gone.

“Sammy,” he lets himself whisper, because the only person who would know how fucked up he is left three years ago, and didn’t come back, isn’t around to notice.

Tyler slips another condom into his hand, slyly, asks him to fuck him. Dean is thinking of someone else, and everything’s so dirty and sticky on his fingers and the thing Dean can’t stop thinking is that he wasn’t dirty when he wanted his brother and his brother wanted him back.

 

“That mouth should be wrapped around something ’sides a beer bottle.”

Dean just about jumps out of his skin. Didn’t see this guy coming. “Thanks, but,” he says, recovering, “Don’t swing that way.” It’s the truth. He doesn’t swing toward truckers with bristly mustaches looking for five minutes of dirt to break up the endless pavement. He hardly turned toward the guy to answer, but he still manages to make a point of fixing his eyes back on the television screen.

“Really,” the guy says, disbelieving. Dean is obnoxiously aware that in the booth ten feet away, Sam is struggling not to laugh at him. He is aware of this, because he’s aware of Sam’s presence, anywhere in a room. Sam is _back_ , and he’s there for Dean to be aware of. Most of the time, Dean has noticed, Sam is looking at him. Especially when they’re in a bar, and Dean is getting hit on by ugly trucker dudes.

“Really,” Dean says, trying to make it final. He goes for another sip of his beer, then thinks better of it.

“Those lips are definitely built for something better,” the guy mumbles.

Dean huffs. He wonders how long he’ll have to put up with this, and with Sam’s noticeable snickering off to the right. Sam should get back to his research, is what he should do. His laptop should be way more entertaining than watching his brother be humiliated.

“Trust me, they’re happy sipping beer,” Dean sighs. On the TV screen, Congressmen in black suits are talking to each other, and Dean’s eyes are starting to blur.

“Fair enough, fair enough,” Skeezy Trucker says. “Let me buy you one, how about?”

Dean grimaces. Does he really, seriously, give off that vibe? He starts to get up, to go bug Sam even though Sam won’t drink with him. But when he turns around to stand, someone grabs him by the elbow and sits down in the stool to his left.

“Sorry I took so long, love,” says the newcomer. Dean gives him a once-over, (cute, tall, ponytail, white smile, twenty-something, works out,) before exchanging glances. “Any trouble?”

Dean gets his bearings, but hasn’t really decided if he’s going to play along or not. He pokes a thumb out behind him, in the direction of the trucker. “Just telling our friend here that I don’t swing in his direction.”

The new guy’s brown eyes flicker in amusement. Then he leans into Dean’s personal space to say to the trucker, “I know it must be a great disappointment, but you can take my word for it: my boyfriend doesn’t swing your way because he’s too busy swinging in _mine_.”

Dean jerks back a little, and says nothing. He decides it’s safe to take a swig of beer now, so he does. Out of the corner of his eye, he watches Trucker Dude slide away from the bar, and beyond that, Sam, sitting behind his laptop, watching curiously.

“I can’t believe my own move just got used on me,” Dean says to his beer.

“What move?” The man to his left hasn’t moved away. Dean meets his eyes, and man, the way the guy’s hair frames his face is really damn attractive.

“The _pretending to be her noble boyfriend to save her from an awkward come-on_ move. I can’t tell you how many girls I’ve used that on.”

The guy helps himself to a sip from Dean’s beer, and it says a lot that Dean isn’t disgruntled about it. “Is it gonna work for me?” he asks, handing the bottle to Dean instead of putting it back on the coaster.

“Not by itself,” Dean offers.

The man considers that, starts fresh. “I’m Keith.”

Dean takes the offered hand. “Dean.”

“What’s your story? You’re not from around here and you’re not a trucker…”

They share a laugh at that. The back of Dean’s neck bristles; Sam’s eyes are fixed there.

Dean can feel his face reddening as they talk. Sam is here, and it changes everything. It shouldn’t. It isn’t as if Dean is fucking his brother, or doing anything wrong like that. Three months they’ve been hunting together, Dean smelling Sam’s sweat and watching him lick his lips and still, on paper, Dean’s not doing anything bad.

But Sam’s watching him, and Dean’s afraid there’s something to see. 

Dean half-listens to Keith talking about photography, while rolling facts in his head. He came to this bar looking to get laid tonight (every night.) Keith is better looking than any of the dairy-farm girls in the room. If Sam were not here, Dean would have a hand on Keith’s thigh already. If Sam were not here, Dean would _be attracted_ to Keith.

He’s not sure what would be worse: admitting that Sam’s presence in the shotgun seat of his car has _replaced_ his (usually plenty healthy) drive for sex with guys, or exposing that the first guy he sleeps with in three months is the _guy who looks most like his brother_.

Either thing is something Sam would notice. Sam never stops watching him. Dean hopes he’ll never stop.

“Dean?” Keith asks, like he realized Dean wasn’t paying attention.

“Sorry.” Dean fidgets. He _hates_ analyzing sexual attraction. “What was that?” He tries to sound apologetic.

“Not important. Listen, am I flunking out?” he asks frankly, palming the loose hairs of his ponytail back.

Badly wanting not to scare away his only good lead of the night, Dean drops his hand to Keith’s thigh and opens his mouth to charm his way out of the hole he dug. But he doesn’t get the chance to say anything.

“Hey Dean,” Sam says swiftly. His hand’s on Dean’s back, and Dean has no idea how he got snuck up on like that. Dean’s vision is a blur, looking up at Sam’s face, tinted bronze by the smell of his skin, his chest inches from Dean’s face. “Are you coming back to our table any time soon, babe?” he says, still swift, and Dean is swept up in the speed as his brother’s mouth lands casually on his own like it’s something that’s happened a thousand times before.

Sam is standing straight again before Dean even realizes they just kissed.

His brother is staring at a beer coaster on the bar, and Dean feels explosive with wanting to ask, _What the fuck are you doing to me?_ He hates the firm set of Sam’s jaw line right now, and the carefully silent smoothness of his forehead. Whatever burst propelled him over here, it’s burnt out, impossible to see. Whatever the burst was, it’s making a smile creep onto Dean’s mouth.

“Oh,” Keith says, and Dean remembers his existence. He removes his hand from Keith’s leg without taking his eyes off Sam’s profile.

“Yeah,” Dean says. “That’s my Sam.” Saying the words feels barely manageable, so there’s no way in hell he can make his shaking body do anything casual to strengthen the case. “I’d better go.”

He follows Sam back to the booth. He takes a seat on the same side like boyfriends would do, in case Keith is watching. Now that Sam’s opening his laptop again, forehead pinched again, his little brother again, it suddenly strikes Dean that he just got tricked into killing his own chances at getting laid tonight, and he doesn’t even know why it happened.

“Uh, what was that for?” Dean asks under his breath, rubbing the back of his neck with his palm because it’s itchy from Sam watching him all the time.

Sam’s jaw is still clenched. He doesn’t drag his eyes away from the computer. “You looked like you needed help.”

Dean tosses the weight of his beer bottle back and forth between his hands. He has no clue what to make of Sam. He has a million ideas about what Sam could be thinking, but he doesn’t know what combination of them is actually in Sam’s mind.

What he does know is that he was going to get laid, and now he’s not, and he couldn’t be happier.

On paper, there’s nothing wrong with that at all.


End file.
